About three years ago, Julie Wolfe started collecting water samples from across the country. She went to New York, Texas, DC, and Maryland, pouring each sample into a jar then mixing in natural ingredients, like squid ink, sandalwood, beets, and turmeric, as well as chemicals like copper sulfate, crystal violet, and methylene blue. She arranged the jars onto shelves, connected them with tubes, and lit the whole thing from behind...

Housed in some 500 glass bottles stacked on metal shelves, the water, sediment and vegetation samples on display in the window of 1700 L St. NW look like a science project. But the contents of the jars, illuminated from behind, also glow with vivid reds, purples and blues, resembling a color-field painting that has been disassembled and liquefied...